Philippine Senate Vote Leads
To Resignations and Protests

By

James Hookway Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

Updated Jan. 17, 2001 12:01 a.m. ET

MANILA, Philippines -- The impeachment trial of President Joseph Estrada was thrown into confusion after senators barred access to what are allegedly his bank records, a move prosecutors said effectively acquits the Philippine leader.

Chief prosecutor Feliciano Belmonte Jr. said he and his colleagues, mostly congressmen, would resign as prosecutors at the House of Representatives Wednesday. Cardinal Jaime Sin, an influential Catholic leader instrumental in the 1986 People Power revolution that ousted dictator Ferdinand...